Why the Water-Facing Side Collects the Webs
Many of the insects that spiders live on begin life in or beside water, and they emerge in numbers on warm evenings. That supply lands on the elevation nearest the canal night after night, which is why one side of a building can be thick with webs while the other stays clear. Nothing about the building is wrong; the spiders are simply where the meals are. What attracts spiders into a property explains why the food supply matters more than anything else you can change.
Window frames and outside lights above the towpath
Orb weavers rebuild a web most nights and will use the same anchor points for weeks, so a balcony rail, the reveal of a floor-length window or the bracket of a light over a path becomes a fixture. A lit room behind uncovered glass does the same job as an outside lamp. Smaller spiders tuck into the corner of a frame, the track of a sliding door or the back of a fitting and stay put, and their webs collect the dust that makes them obvious.
Garages, sheds and storage units
Cool, dim and undisturbed is the other half of it. A garage or shed in the older streets, a store that gets opened twice a year, and the trade and storage units along the canal and off Ealing Road all keep webs along the roof line and behind whatever is stacked against a wall. A store or unit forming part of a business is quoted per site rather than by the room, so say what it is when you call; Park Royal covers commercial premises.
False Widows Around Frames and Outside Fittings
The noble false widow is glossy and dark brown, with a rounded body and pale markings across its back, and it favours gaps round window frames, sheds and the backs of outdoor fittings. It does not count as a dangerous spider, and being bitten by one is an unusual event; where it does happen, the sensation is generally compared with a bee or wasp sting. Anyone whose bite swells badly or starts to look infected should speak to a pharmacist or GP, and signs of a severe allergic reaction after any bite or sting mean calling 999. Which spiders in Brent can actually hurt you puts the whole question in proportion.
The Big Spiders of September
From late summer, adult male house spiders leave the gaps they have spent the year in and go looking for a mate, which is why they turn up in a bath, on a stair or crossing a floor after dark. They are not building anything and they are not a sign of an infestation; a few every autumn is ordinary anywhere with a garage, a store or planting close by. A build-up looks quite different, with webs and egg sacs returning to the same room week after week whatever you do. That is the subject of why spiders keep appearing in the same rooms, while where spiders hide inside homes is the place to begin looking.
What a Treatment Changes, and What It Does Not
Treatment is for rooms inside your own home where spiders and webs keep rebuilding, and it can bring those numbers down. It cannot stop insects coming off the water at dusk or spiders following them, and the outside of a block, including reveals you cannot reach and the lighting along a communal path, is for the managing agent to keep on top of, so persistent webs there are worth reporting rather than treating. Whether pest control can reduce spider problems is honest about the limits, and why there seem to be so many spiders covers the seasonal swings.
Where spiders are feeding on another pest indoors, that has to be sorted out as well. Wool rugs and stored clothing can support carpet moths, and fluff along a skirting or under a bed can hold carpet beetle larvae. Whether lots of spiders mean another pest problem looks at the link, and it is worth checking before assuming spiders are the whole story.
Before you book
- List the rooms inside your own home where webs keep returning, leaving out the hall, the landing and the stairs
- Say whether a garage, shed or store is part of your home or shared with the rest of the building
- Pull boxes and stored things away from the walls and corners of those rooms so they can be reached
- Say which corners the false widows are in, with a photograph taken from a safe distance if you managed one
Spiders from outside will still wander in from time to time, particularly in autumn and particularly on the canal side. If the treated rooms fill with webs again, call us back and say which ones.
Fewer Webs on an Alperton Canal Frontage
Light and regular clearing do most of the work. Reducing spiders around windows and doors goes into detail, how to stop spiders coming back covers the weeks after a visit, and Spider Control Brent covers homes across the borough.
- Draw blinds or curtains after dark so indoor light does not spill onto the glass facing the water
- Switch off balcony and outside lights when they are not needed, or fit warmer-coloured bulbs where the fitting is yours
- Brush webs and egg sacs off rails, reveals and fittings every week or two from August onwards
- Keep stored things in lidded crates rather than open cardboard, above all in a garage or a shared store
- Fill gaps around window and door frames, which keeps out the insects as well as what eats them
